"…whatever name they gave their bond they each in their own
way believed it required them to protect the other, and so neither talked much
of drifting apart, not wanting to inflict a fear of abandonment, while also
themselves quietly feeling that fear, the fear of the severing of their tie,
the end of the world they had built together, a world of shared experiences in
which no one else would share, and a shared intimate language that was unique
to them, and a sense that what they might break was special and likely
irreplaceable. But while fear was part of what kept them together for those
first few months in Marin, more powerful than fear was the desire that each see
the other find firmer footing before they let go, and thus in the end their
relationship did in some senses come to resemble that of siblings, in that
friendship was its strongest element, and unlike many passions, theirs managed
to cool slowly, without curdling into its reverse, anger, except
intermittently."
~ Hamid Mohsin, Exit West, 2017